10 Facts About Star Trek: Discovery That Will Make You Either Love It Or Hate It

Advertisements

It seems the Star Trek franchise has been going on for ages, gracing fans with numerous episodes that deal with space exploration, extra-terrestrial species, and building relationships between various civilizations. We’ve also seen our fair share of more than spectacular movies, but Star Trek’s story is yet far from its ending. Star Trek: Discovery is the sixth live-action series, taking place 10 years before The Original Series. This means we get to enjoy a classic retro feel of the show mixed with cool sci-fi gadgets and futuristic technologies to keep it modern. Yet there’s a number of things that make this show stand out from the rest, as well as more than a few Easter eggs and references hiding in the background. Here are 10 cool facts about Star Trek: Discovery that will make you either love it or hate it.

It’s not all about the captains (yet)
Although we’ve gotten used to captains being in the centre of a story in the Star Trek Universe (from Kirk to Janeway and Picard), this is not exactly the case with the new series. The new story is told from a perspective of the first officer Michael Burnham, who seems to be a perfect fit for the captain’s seat, but jeopardizes not only her career, but her whole life with a decision that puts two civilizations at war. Starting the series like that is a really bold move if you want our opinion!

The ship is based on a 70’s design
USS Discovery’s sleek design has a distinct retro feel to it that takes us back all the way to the original series of Star Trek. It appears that its look was actually based on a starship design for a scrapped film Star Trek: Planet of the Titans. For that project Ralph McQuarrie, an illustrator who worked on the original Battlestar Galactica and Star Wars trilogy, created a special re-design for Enterprise. Nearly 40 years later his unused concept art became the basis for the USS Discovery and we finally got to enjoy this amazing work.Number One
In the show’s premiere episode we notice Captain Georgiou refer to Commander Burnham as Number One, the very nickname Captain Picard gave Commander Riker in Star Trek: The Next Generation. Not many people know that the history of this nickname dates back even further, to The Original Series. In its pilot, Number One is Star Treks first ever female officer, played by series creator Gene Roddenberry’s wife Majel Barrett-Roddenberry. Although the character was removed during the show’s post-pilot redesign, the pilot is considered canon by most Trekkies.

It’s called ‘Discovery’ for a reason
Yes, Star Trek is all about space exploration and exciting discoveries, but this is not the only reason the series is called that way. The name is also a reference to the Discovery 1 spacecraft from 2001: A Space Odyssey, as well as the real life space shuttle Discovery that marked more than a few ‘firsts’ for NASA, most notably hosting the first female shuttle pilot Eileen Collins.